Two Kids From the Citadel
by elle45
Summary: Just a collection of Ryder/Liam fluff and drabble.
1. Chapter 1

Liam took a deep breath, counted to three, and tried to remind himself that this was exactly what he signed up for. Exploration. A leap into the unknown. A brand new start for all the different races of the Milky Way, free from their historic hostilities and territorial disputes. A chance to start a bright new society where people had both choices and chances.

He just didn't know why these people were making _these_ choice and taking _these_ chances. He just wanted to shake Tann and Addison and Kandros, shake their common sense loose from wherever it was hiding and force them to look around. They were scared. He could understand scared. But their fear was making them blind to the possibilities.

What was it Drack said when they first met? About all those Initiative idiots thinking they were safe, just waiting to die up in space?

He re-read his latest message from Verand, offering to trade some of their information for his. It was a fair deal, honestly, and he didn't want to try and get something for nothing. Not tech, not information- he didn't want the angara to think for a second that the Initiative were users. Like the kett. But the things Verand wanted weren't really his to give.

And there was no way anybody from the Nexus would sign off on that.

No way the Pathfinder would, either. She couldn't officially sanction going behind Tann's back. He wouldn't put her in the position of having to say yes or no. Either answer would put her between a rock and a hard place.

He jittered around the cargo bay for a moment, blessedly uninterrupted- privacy being a rare and beautiful commodity on a ship—before deciding he couldn't make this call yet. He had to give the Nexus an opportunity to establish relations with the angara properly.

Unable to sit still, he stripped out of his uniform shirt and hooked his hands up on the lip of the overhead storage bin. It wasn't meant to be a pull up bar, but it would do in a pinch. And everything about Andromeda so far was definitely a pinch.

He pulled himself up, and curled his knees up to his chest, doing his best to control every aspect of the movement. He was only three reps in when the door hissed open.

_Sara_.

Ryder, the Pathfinder, he corrected his internal monologue. She hesitated in the doorway. He hesitated too, but after a moment he decided to continue what he was doing.

"That looks. . . difficult," she said. She leaned against the doorframe, crossing her arms over her chest. Her eyes followed his progress. He couldn't help but grin.

"Supposed to be," he explained. "Not a biotic. Only got my muscles to get me positioned right when I jump jet right up a baddie's nose."

"Makes sense." She kept watching. He did two more, then let himself drop down lightly onto his feet. They'd shared a few drinks, comfortably. He knew her well enough by now to know she'd tell him what she wanted in her own time. She was what his mom would have called reserved. But her facial expressions never hid her thoughts. She'd make a bad liar, and a worse poker player- though she, like him, tended to abstain from gambling. Right now she looked pensive.

So the key would be to make sure she knew she was welcome.

He pulled up two bottles of beer, fresh from the Vortex—the still was practically the first thing set up on the Nexus—and offered her one. She accepted with a wry smile and unfolded at last, plopping down on the couch. He joined her, consciously unhitching the tight knots that threatened to kink up his back.

"We're en route back to Prodromos," she said. She took a sip of her beer. A true soldier, she didn't even grimace at the taste. The chemist at the Vortex brewed a very sour mash. Her eyes rested on some point beyond the far wall, her shoulders hunched. "There's some kind of kett power station right near our outpost. And, surprise surprise, the bunch of scientists I sent out there isn't equipped to handle that kind of thing."

"Regretting your choice, Pathfinder?" he asked. She snorted, and glanced up at him at last. In return for his open grin she gave him a shaky smile. A good trade.

"Live fire didn't kill my dad. It was tech we didn't understand. Tech we shouldn't have been messing with. And we have to _keep_ messing with it, we can't just. . . no. Science was the right priority for the outpost," she said. He smiled brighter, reflecting out the warmth that hearing her talk could build up in his chest. Just above his heart. "I can run a sweep, I can send an APEX team, but I can't keep settlers from dying because there's some kind of microbe that gets into the hydroponics."

"So what's giving you heartburn about this?" he asked. She took another sip of her beer.

"What, I can't be apprehensive about leading a strike team against an entire kett facility?"

"Uh, no?" he laughed. She looked at him in surprise, her eyebrows climbing. "First fifteen minutes I knew you, you were shoulder-down yelling at me to hurry up jump jetting across a lightning moat. And it's only gotten weirder from there. One little kett power station is nothing. You got this."

"Ha," she muttered. She favored him with a speculative look, but he'd managed to get that smile to stick around on the corner of her lips. He counted that a win. "That wasn't when we met, you know."

"It wasn't?" Now she'd surprised him.

"You don't remember?" She set her beer down, and folded her legs up so she was sitting indian-style on the couch. He didn't say a word to her about her feet being on the irreplaceable antiques, though he considered it. "I guess we weren't really introduced. But I saw you when you came in for screening."

He was just surprised, he told himself. That was why his heart started racing all of a sudden. Trying to remember what stupid things he might have done in front of the woman who became the Pathfinder.

"You remember that?" he asked. He didn't, that was for sure. But all the people he met in the rush of his preparations to leave the Milky Way tended to blur together. He remembered being interviewed by Alec Ryder, personally, and he'd met Scott briefly. Greer, too. But not her.

"Pretty much the whole Pathfinder team was there. Dad's team. My team? A little more scattered," she acknowledged. He laughed off some of his ridiculous nerves and she laughed, too, so already things were better than they were when she came in. "I never thanked you, did I? After Habitat 7, you stayed with me until I woke up."

He swallowed, hard, past the residual fear of things-that-didn't-go-wrong. She seemed to notice, and more, give a shit, because she leaned in, her eyes steady on his face. There went that little cheerful fire again, burning away in his chest.

"We're in this together, Pathfinder. Not about to leave you on your own," he said, and he toasted her. His voice came out softer than he really meant, but she seemed to understand him. She always seemed to understand. Something soft and warm sparked in her eyes, and his will to keep the conversation light and easy hiccupped to a halt.

"So," she said, after an interminable time where he just stared right at her like the gormless idiot he was, "you up for storming a kett facility?"

"Oh, you know I'm in," he assured her. "Question is, do you want to take Jaal or Drack? Jaal is good long-range support for your biotic charges but Drack's basically an artillery unit."


	2. Chapter 2

The inside of the Nomad was warmer than the icy winds of Voeld, but not warm enough. Sara's death grip on the wheel was much harder to maintain with her numb fingers. It was a real shame she couldn't wear mittens over her armored gloves.

"Steady hand at the wheel, Ryder?" Liam asked, laughter in his voice like always. He was behind her, next to Cora, the two of them scrunched in the surprisingly sparse passenger area of the Nomad.

"I got this," she assured him. Which was not, strictly speaking, true. It was possible the track they were on was at one point meant to be a road, but now it was just a very curving ledge coated in ice, snow, and more ice. But if it turned out she didn't have this, well, there wouldn't be much of an opportunity afterward to yell at her about it.

"This is a beautiful world," Cora said, her soft wonderment leaking through. Over the past few months, she'd noticed Cora had two voices. Her Combat Voice, and her normal voice. Combat Cora barked orders like a commander, and her tone never relaxed down past "harsh." Regular Cora sounded like a little girl coming out of a space station to see the open sky for the first time. It reminded Sara of what Scott said, back on the Citadel, before—

"Beautiful and deadly. My favorite combo," Liam said, and she could hear his grin. She felt like she'd swallowed boiling water. Was he flirting with Cora?

And why not? She'd tried flirting with Cora, briefly, before the former commando explained she was not at all into women. It was half-hearted, rooted as much in missing Scott and wanting to one-up her twin while he was still unconscious as thinking Cora was attractive. But if Liam liked her, well, Sara could see the attraction.

God. What if the two of them ended up together?

She'd met up with Scott for food right after their health screening on the Citadel. She'd met, or at least seen, most of the Pathfinder team that day. It was exciting—a group of people from all different backgrounds that Dad would lead. Specialists. Explorers. Like her, and like Scott. But Scott looked almost dour when they met for noodles.

"Do you think Dad has like, an entire ounce of subtlety in his whole body? Because if he does, I've got a concern," Scott had said. She'd laughed, and punched his arm. And she wished she could do that again, right now, because she hadn't laughed at Scott in over six hundred years.

"Not a single ounce," she told him, "unless it's about covert ops. Is it about covert ops?"

"It's about matchmaking," Scott had told her. And he'd leaned in, like he was imparting a great secret. Even though no one else in the lively noodle shop cared about their conversation at all. "You met Cora, right?"

She'd told him yeah, of course, she'd made an effort to get to know both of the other women Dad picked out for the Pathfinder team. But Scott was convinced that Cora was exactly the kind of woman Dad always wanted him to end up with—idealistic, military, and above-all disciplined as hell. He'd made her laugh so hard she couldn't eat, moping about how Dad always wanted him to be a rise-at-dawn go-getter and now the old man was deliberately putting him in the orbit of a beautiful woman that was exactly the kind of solider Scott wasn't.

But then her brother had leveled his chopsticks at her like he was threatening to stab her with them, and announced in dire tones, "Don't laugh so hard. Dad's got somebody picked out for you, too."

"I really don't think he does, bud," she'd said. "You're paranoid. Dad might, like, think in terms of whose combat skills best complement each other, but personalities . . ."

"He's a total dork. I just met the guy, and he rattled off a bunch of junk about how close the Initiative armor was going to be to something out of some movie. I can already tell you he's seen all those old vids you like," Scott had insisted. "Big guy. Pulled out of some kind of special squad. Bet you Dad wants me to tighten down and you to loosen up, and he's - "

"If you think Dad's ever wanted any human being to loosen up, you're crazy," she'd laughed. But Scott was unconvinced.

"Bet you ten credits," her twin had said, "that you're banging Kosta before we've been in Andromeda a year."

And she'd taken the bet. Right after she threatened to put Scott's baby pictures on the web if he ever talked about her "banging" anybody ever again.

Back then that bet felt like a win-win. She'd either end up proving her brother wrong, and get ten credits, or she'd end up seeing someone. Right now, hearing Liam chuckle with Cora right behind her, it didn't feel like a win-win anymore.

But they were her team. Her people. She couldn't let personal stuff get in the way of the things they had to do. And if she let either of them see that she was bothered, it would get in the way. They'd get awkward and stiff and stilted around her. So she swallowed the lump in her throat and did her best not to let her shoulders clench and hunch.

They all piled out of the Nomad with her while she replaced the angaran medical caches. As usual, Cora and Liam watched her back. She stayed out of it when they all got back in the Nomad and the two of them started joking with each other and teasing her about her driving. She plastered a distant, professional smile on her face and tried really, really hard not to think about how it would feel if Liam and Cora got together.

Because Scott was right. Liam was a huge, huge dork. Like her. She couldn't imagine lounging around watching vids with anyone and being more comfortable. Scott hadn't mentioned, probably hadn't even noticed, Liam's beautiful liquid brown eyes or his ready smile. And he couldn't have known at all that every time she jumped into the middle of a hot situation Liam would be hot on her heels, slicing up "baddies" with those overclocked omniblades.

And if it was just that, just that he was cute and they made a good team, it would be fine. No big deal. She really wanted it to be no big deal. But when he turned that smile on her something hot in the center of her chest tightened, cutting off her air and making it hard to think, and she was very much afraid that it was a Big Deal after all.

A big deal she did not _at all_ have time for.

After a long day attempting to improve their relations with the angara by running various errands for the Resistance, she found herself scanning a frozen lake for a cloaked wraith.

"All right there, Pathfinder?" Liam's voice sounded behind her. She rolled her eyes. Of course. One of them would follow her out, keeping an eye on her even for this.

"Yeah, just helping out that sniper back on the ice atoll," she said, not looking up from her scanner. She felt, more than saw, Liam take up position behind her. Off to the side, where he could watch her back for threats.

"Not what I meant," he said, and his voice was pitched low. Probably an attempt to prevent it from carrying across the ice. "It's all right if you want me to mind my own business, but, you seem tense. Everything all right?"

Crap. Of course he noticed.

"Yeah. It's fine." There. She found the heat signature, and clicked her signal over to the sniper. A shot rang out, and she could tell it hit—the wraith came uncloaked, it jerked, but it didn't go down. In a split second she readied her biotics and threw the beast back. It cracked against the icy hills. And it was down.

"So," she continued, her tone deliberately casual, "you think Cora's beautiful and deadly, huh?"

"What?" he practically squawked. She could look at him now, the incredulity on his face, the wide gestures of his hands as he talked. "I wasn't talking about Cora."

"It's none of my . . .I mean, sorry. I shouldn't have said anything," she said. Even in the cold her cheeks burned. But Liam's eyes were twinkling, his grin lopsided and just this side of rueful. He glanced from her to the dead wraith, his eyebrows cocked in amused disbelief.

"What? Why not? Civilian ship. You can ask whatever," he assured her. He wasn't pitching his voice low anymore. Probably everyone back on that atoll could hear them. Perfect. "But did you see what you just did to that wraith? You're a stone cold badass, you are. You're the deadliest person I know. And I know Drack."

"See, now I know you're just puffing me up," she said, but she could feel herself smiling back at him. It felt like falling, like taking a leap off some high place and trusting in her biotics and her gear to see her safe to the ground.

"A little," he admitted. "But not so much as you might think. Let's get out of here. My lungs are turning into ice."

She walked with him back to the atoll with good grace, in a far better mood than before. But there was a question, burning around the edges of her tongue and threatening to slip out of her mouth. A question she couldn't ask, because no matter what the answer was she didn't have time to deal with it. But it ricocheted around the inside of her skull regardless.

_So, you were calling me beautiful?_


	3. Chapter 3

Liam went over his armor, bit by bit, repairing all the little cracks before they could become problems. Unfastening everything, cleaning it out, getting it all hooked back together. Gave him an excuse to keep his head down, in the crowded central hub of the ship. He couldn't keep his face blank, but he could keep his head down.

God_damn_ that Reyes.

Even Liam could admit the smuggler was handsome. Better looking than your average freeloading drunk, that was for sure. And he had that air, like butter wouldn't melt in his mouth. The man was obviously up to something. Anyone could see it.

Worse, anyone with eyes and ears could tell what it was Reyes wanted to be up to. And who he wanted to drag down with him.

_Worse_, Sara seemed to like the man. Spent time in his company. In bars. Voluntarily. And he knew for damn sure she'd been flirting with him.

If only his dad could see him now. Dad would have pegged Reyes for a schemer the second he laid eyes on him, and he'd have told Liam not to worry. _If a woman goes for a guy like that, my boy, she's not the woman for you._

Except Liam couldn't bring himself to be Above It All. Couldn't stand back and just let Sara make her choices, like a proper friend should. If that was even what they were. They were something, sure enough, the whole crew coming together like a team or a family, and she was at the heart of all of it. But it didn't give him the right to crowd her, or pressure her.

And now he'd gone and done something stupid.

Of course Reyes knew something about the Roekar murders. And of course the man had to set up his own little explosives, couldn't be a team player. No, he had to make the big dramatic entrance. So they'd rolled up, him and Sara and Jaal, to the Roekar base without a single trace of their friendly neighborhood smuggler. And Sara asked where Reyes was.

That was it. That was when it happened. He'd felt the words bubbling and boiling up out of his chest, and he couldn't have stopped them if he'd clapped both hands over his mouth and fell backwards.

"Keep it in your pants!" He'd practically shouted. At her. While they were trying to sneak into a base full of baddies. Her eyes had gotten so wide, and he'd known right that second it was a mistake. "Or out. Whatever."

But it was too late.

He was an idiot.

He could have got them all killed. And for what?

He felt clumsy and foolish as a teenager again. All snark and painfully earnest emotions he didn't even have names for. It wasn't supposed to be like this. He wasn't supposed to be like this. As a goddamn adult he should be able to keep his mouth shut on his stupid jealousy when it could get them killed.

Ryder wandered down from the upper level, past the Nomad, and he didn't look up at her. Just watched, grateful his rising blush wasn't so visible on his skin, out of the corner of his eye. But she didn't come for him. She wandered over to Vetra and struck up a conversation.

With careful, deliberate movements, Liam put the finishing touches on his armor. All shined and polished. All but that one brace, the one that broke the day he fell onto Habitat 7. When he met Sara.

"Did you come over with anybody? Anybody special?" he heard her ask, and his head snapped up. Vetra. She'd asked Vetra that. She'd never asked him. Maybe because it was obvious that no, no he hadn't. He wasn't exactly shy about his feelings. If he had a wife or something waiting in cryo, everyone on the ship would know about it by now. They'd probably know the woman's favorite flavor of tea, favorite book, all the classics.

"No. Nobody like that. Who's got the time?" Vetra asked, but dear God, was that a flirtatious edge in her voice? He didn't know Vetra even had flirtatious edges. "What about you?"

He turned back to his armor and tried to look Very Busy. And not like a giant idiot.

"Same. Who's got the time?" Sara said.

He let out a breath he didn't even know he was holding.

He let their conversation fade into the background. No reason to eavesdrop. He should know better. Crowded ship, you've got to give people the privacy available. And pretending you can't hear them talk is sometimes the best you've got.

"Hey, Liam." Except there she was, right next to him, saying hello. And why not? Why wouldn't she? He plastered his best blank face over his nerves and met her eyes.

"Ryder. What's up?" There. That sounded neutral. Not at all like he was going to go into Raving Madman Mode the next time they were sneaking into a kett facility and start yelling like some asshole ex-boyfriend.

"Just checking in." There was something uneasy in her grimace. And, hell, that was on him, wasn't it?

Least he could do was apologize.

"I wanted to say—sorry. I lost my cool and I alerted the Roekar to our position. It could have gone bad. I just. . . sorry. It won't happen again." God, his mouth was an idiot.

But she didn't seem repulsed. She just gave him a considering look. Tilted her head to the side. And yeah, he was in real trouble here, because all he could think about was how pretty her eyes were and how soft her skin looked and maybe if she—

"Good," she said, and he yanked himself back to reality. Where they were all real adults, not teenagers going crazy, and they all had real jobs to do. "I'll. . . talk to you later."

"I know it," he said. And he gave her a smile, and a nod, and he took his armor upstairs. Because maybe Jaal would be in the mood to tell him some stories or show him how to mod a kett rifle and do something to get his damn mind off this.

He found Jaal in the tech lab upstairs, as usual, and let the door hiss shut again behind him. Jaal was mucking about with something on his reader, but his eyes flicked up to Liam when he entered.

"Ah. Good. I wanted to talk to you," Jaal said. Liam laid his armor down on one of the ever-present boxes of spare parts, and wandered over to Jaal, hands on his hips. The angara's face was serious, no trace of a smile on his mouth, but that wasn't so unusual. He could be mercurial, shifting from one emotion to the next in the blink of an eye. And he always, always wore his heart on his sleeve. It was relaxing, in a way, to always know where you stood with Jaal.

"I'm down for whatever. Came up for a distraction. Got to get out of my head," Liam explained. Jaal grimaced understanding. He knew all about staying busy to keep bad thoughts at bay. They'd stripped several kett guns down to bolts after rescuing the Moshae, working side by side in companionable silence.

"I have noticed that your people's reluctance to discuss their emotions openly extends to. . . how do I put this? Romance? Mating ritual? You all seem very hesitant to talk about that aspect of life. Even though, without it, there can be no life to follow you," Jaal said. Liam groaned. He rubbed his face hard with the heels of both hands, yanking on his hair on the way up. Jaal raised what would have been an eyebrow, if he had hair. "Is this topic shameful?"

"Sort of?" How could he explain this without really stepping in the muck? "It's not something we talk about. Except in the abstract. Until we have talked about it with the person we want to be with, and they said they want to be with us. Make sense? It's like, you don't want to say you're interested in someone you don't know is interested in you, because it will just embarrass you both if they aren't. And then if you have to work together or something it's all awkward."

"That's. . . a very clumsy and, quite honestly, ridiculous way to organize yourselves. But I had a more specific question in mind. It's about Reyes Vidal," Jaal said. Liam groaned again. He plopped down on one of the boxes of parts, hands dangling between his knees. Whatever followed, it was not going to help him get his mind off his problems. "What?"

"Nothing. Just. . . what about him?"

"It appears he is attempting to . . . win Ryder over. Court her. Or, I don't want to be crude. How would you say it?"

"Date her."

"It appears he is attempting to date Ryder. And, she seems to be receptive to that idea. Am I interpreting human behavior correctly?" Jaal asked. Liam sighed.

"Yeah."

"And you do not want them to. . . date."

"Not especially," Liam said, slipping into sarcasm. He hadn't told anyone, not even Jaal, about that night in the cargo bay. About all the little glances and touches and smiles and moments that made him feel like maybe he was falling into something brilliant and beautiful here. And then they went to Kadara. And met Reyes Vidal. "Is that obvious?"

"Yes. Of course. These things should be obvious. How can you say you're truly falling in love with someone if you can bring yourself to hide it? That goes beyond customs," Jaal said. He held up a hand as if to forestall argument. "But my point is, I do not like it either."

"Why? Are you. . ." Oh, shit. What a place for human-angaran relations to start. "Interested in Ryder?"

"She is a lovely woman. I enjoy her company, but I don't know her well enough to wish for more," Jaal said, bluntly. As could have been expected. "The point is, this Reyes Vidal is not trustworthy. It is part of our job to protect the Pathfinder. Does that extend to protecting her from bad decisions?"

"Oh, mate," Liam said. He shook his head, despondently. "Not so much."

"It is a valid concern. I would discourage any of my brothers or sisters from making such a match," Jaal protested.

"Yeah, well. You can tell her you're worried, if you want. Leave me out of it if you do. I've made myself enough of a pest about that," Liam said. "You heard me hollering at her in the Roekar base. We humans call that kind of behavior 'possessive' and it's not my best look."

"Hmm. So you are embarrassed," Jaal said, meditatively. Liam drummed his fingers against the box. "And you plan to do what about it?"

"Nothing, if I can help it. It'll blow over," Liam said. Jaal made a skeptical noise.

"And it would be rude to insist to Ryder that she not date people of unknown habits and morals?" Jaal asked. Liam beat out a quick tattoo with his fingertips. He reminded himself that Jaal was actually asking, that this was a whole other culture to him.

"Yeah. We only get to talk to certain people about their dating decisions. You only get a vote if you're family, pretty much." He thought about that a moment. "Or, I guess, maybe asari and turians do it differently. I'm pretty sure the krogan aren't shy about their opinions. And there's bound to be lots of variations. But if you're friends, you just get to say, hey that guy looks like trouble but I respect your choices."

"Hmm. Your cultural rules about emotional honesty are extremely complex," Jaal noted, not for the first time. "I maintain we should write a guide, for the angara."

"I still think it's a bad idea. Cultural norms change all the time. Your people are going to rub off on us. What's true now won't be true for our kids," Liam said. Jaal grunted- no need to talk about that all over again. They'd beat that topic to death. "Anyway, please tell me you've got something up here to work on? I'll do fluid viscosity calculations. Anything you got."

"Mmm, I do have a concern about this fusion mod I picked up on Kadara," Jaal said. Blessedly. Liam grinned for the first time all day.

"Well, give it here. Let's see what makes it tick," he said. Jaal picked it up off the workbench and handed it over. But apparently his angaran friend wasn't done.

"Have you never wanted to date someone before?" Jaal said. Liam almost dropped the tech in his hands. He laughed out loud.

"Course I have. Is that a serious question? How young do I look?" He might have expected this from Drack, but not Jaal. "Where's that coming from?"

"If you don't talk about it, how do you come together?" Jaal asked. And he was perfectly serious. Liam took a deep breath. No one ever talked about this part of first contact. It was all economics and guns and big picture stuff. How to Explain Your Sex Life To Spacemen shoulda been in the pamphlet.

"Sometimes things don't work out. Sometimes you miss your chance," Liam said. "Different people work it out differently. _Everybody_ works differently, you know? No standard options. But usually you kind of see a moment, and you feel like it's the right time to talk about it. So you do. You just don't shout it from the rooftops the moment you catch a feeling."

"And you've successfully found these moments?" Jaal asked. Liam stilled his hands, consciously, not to tap or pick at the mod he held.

"Yeah. Couple of times. Had some relationships that worked out for a while, you know, but turned out to not be forever. Sometimes life takes you a different direction. Shit happens." Did the angara even do serial monogamy? Polyamory? They seemed so dedicated in their relationships. But that could be the effect of the kett invasion—people tended to hunker down when they didn't think they'd live long. "You ever have it work with someone for a while, but then, it stops working? So you have to call it quits?"

"In a manner of speaking," Jaal said. He rolled his shoulders, uncomfortably. Didn't like it so much when the shoe was on the other foot, did he? "She ended up falling in love with my brother."

"Yeowch," Liam said. That was much, much worse than anything he'd gone through. He held up the fusion mod like it was a peace offering. "I'm sorry that happened, mate. Let's just study this tech for a while, yeah? Shit's getting heavy."

"Sure."


	4. Chapter 4

"I think that's all of them," Vetra said. Sara straightened, letting her biotics dissipate slowly. Sam sounded in her head, on their private channel. _There are no living hostiles in the area. But, Pathfinder, Liam is not moving._

Her heart skipped a beat.

She scrambled over the rocks and lush, poison greenery, looking for a flash of white and blue in the undergrowth of Havarl. Vetra, of course, hadn't heard any of Sam's comments but she saw Sara scrambling and followed.

There.

Half under a fern, gun still in his hand. It looked like he'd gotten knocked back, maybe his shields got taken out by a Roakar sniper or something. She fell to her knees, stupidly reaching for his throat like she was going to find a pulse through her thick gloves, and then she remembered her scanner.

_It was just a matter of time. What, you think you can kill dozens of enemy combatants and not lose a single man? You're not superheroes._

Breathing. Alive. Her scan showed a fully functioning heart, circulatory system fine, nervous system up and running, only a small fracture in his shoulderblade and a cut on the back of his head that honestly wasn't going to be too big of a deal- okay. He was going to be fine. He was knocked out, but it didn't look like he had swelling under his skull. He hadn't cracked his head, just cut the skin above the back of his neck.

While she was kneeling over him, scanning him, his eyes fluttered open.

"Idiot," Vetra hissed. And it was good somebody said it, because she couldn't talk past the panic in her throat. And he was surely an idiot. "What did I tell you about letting your shield run down?"

"I's what its for," Liam grumbled. He sat, wincing, and looked around. "All good, then?"

"You seem to be down approximately four hundred milliliters of blood," Sam noted. "And I believe you have suffered a fracture to your scapula."

"Nothing Lexi can't patch," Liam assured them. He stood, slowly, careful not to move his back too much. It made him stiff. The entire back of his armor was coated in blood. It looked like a lot more than a couple milliliters. But he offered her a hand to help her stand like it was nothing. Like he was fine. She didn't take it.

"Here," she said, rising to her feet and slipping around behind him. "We need to stop that bleeding."

It was a relatively small cut. Head wounds always bleed like none other. It didn't take much medigel.

"Foolish. Reckless," Vetra hissed, clearly not done dressing him down. "You took yourself completely out of the fight with that idiocy."

"It's called flanking," he protested.

"What if they'd had reinforcements? Me and Ryder would have been trying to hold that shitty position with just the two of us. They were about to move up the ridge- we wouldn't have had cover for that. What good are you to anybody when you're knocked out?" Vetra said. Liam swayed. Scowling.

"Sorry. I'll try to get shot less," Liam drawled. His sarcasm lacked a certain edge. But maybe that was just in her head, because she was staring at the sticky, red blood that should have been inside Liam's body.

"We need to get out of here." Sara cut across the bickering. Her voice sounded calm, which was crazy, because she was the furthest thing from calm. But it was a good trick. "Sam?"

"I have contacted Kallo. He should be sending down an orbital station. We can evacuate form there," Sam said. And sure enough, before he was even done talking, she heard the jets.

_He's been reckless, even for Liam. Seems like he's trying to impress somebody_, Lexi had said.

She got her people back on the Tempest. Had Lexi take charge of Liam's injuries, talked to Vetra until she calmed down. But she wasn't calm herself. Sam kept noting her heart rate in their private channel. Asking if she needed assistance.

She didn't. She needed to know that no one was going to get killed trying to look cool for her.

She found Liam in the crew quarters, sipping out of an unreasonably large cup. He gave her a rakish grin.

"You ever donate blood, Ryder?" he asked. She sat down, elbows on her knees, right next to him.

"Donate it? Is that slang for something?"

"No, it's—I wasn't sure, see, in crisis response sometimes we'd be out places they didn't have synthesizers. Had to take blood from a living person if somebody needed it. Only take about five hundred milliliters at a time, unless it's a real emergency. Don't want to drain anybody dry," he said. He took another big sip out of his cup. "This feels about like that. Funny the things you get reminded of. Anyway, I'm supposed to drink an ice runner's cargo worth of water. Doc's orders."

"Liam. . "

"Uh-oh. What? Don't tell me you're with Vetra on this."

"You could have gotten yourself killed."

"Could get killed lots of ways."

"It's worse than that, and you know it." She took a deep breath. What good was it to have her own personal internal computer if it couldn't feed her lines in awkward situations? She wished she'd told Sam to help her find the words for this. Too late now. Probably wouldn't have worked out anyway. "You're a good shot, and you've got plenty of tricks up your sleeve besides those omniblades. You should keep to cover unless you absolutely have to be in the open."

"I didn't see that second wraith," Liam shook his head. "Could have been more careful. But no guarantee that sniper wouldn't have taken one of you out before I got to him with ammo alone. This didn't look thought out, but it wasn't random. I had a plan."

"I just want you to be more careful about your own safety," she said. She made herself smile and punch him in the arm. Just a couple of soldiers, palling around. "I already think you're cool. You don't have to charge a sniper's nest to prove it."

"Noted," Liam said, and he smiled, but it wasn't a palling around kind of smile. It was something surprised and soft. Something that made her chest tight and her cheeks warm. She stood up, an idiot smile spreading her lips. She hadn't had much free time at all since Evfra sent them to Kadara and she got sucked hard into local politics. Hadn't had time or brain space to explore this weird _thing_ she had going with Liam. But it did keep popping up.

"Drink your water. You piss Lexi off, I can't protect you from the consequences," she said. Light, and funny, and friendly. All the things she was trying really hard to be.

"Quite right," Liam said, and they waved each other off. She retreated to her cabin.

_Your heartrate still hasn't dropped back to homeostasis, Pathfinder._

"I know, Sam," she whispered.


	5. Chapter 5

"I thought you could use the night off."

Liam froze, halfway to calling up the research module. That was Reyes' voice. Up above him, from the comm room. He could just make out the top edge of Sara's head, over the railing.

Shit.

Cora had raised her eyes from the strike team reports and she was watching him. He fought to keep from openly scowling. He couldn't very well stalk off in a huff, now could he? Had to work with everyone. Keep working with everyone. So he pulled up the armor specs he'd come out here to work on. But he couldn't focus on them.

His whole body was tense, straining to hear what she said.

"Sorry, Reyes. I don't have the time," Sara said. "There's too much to do."

"A shame," Reyes was saying, but Liam didn't care.

_Going to have to admit it sooner or later. Heart's run away with your head._

"Not in the mood for shore leave, Ryder?" Cora asked. Liam glanced up, looking from one woman to another. Cora had that sideways little smile on, but neither of them were paying the least bit of attention to him.

"Fun's fun," Sara said, and he wished he knew what _that_ meant. "But I'm not flying us all to Kadara so I can spent the night drinking with Slone Kelley. If I'm taking a night off I want to watch bad vids and drink good beer."

"I've got vids," Liam offered. He smiled, gesturing at both women. "Only bad beer, though. I don't think any of the good stuff made the trip."

"I'll take it," Ryder said. She stretched, hands clasped over her head. "If I'm still awake after I go through Addison's expense reports. You in, Cora?"

"Think I'll sit this one out," the commando said. And she turned that sideways little smile at him. He could have sworn she winked. But it was so fast, it could have just been his imagination.

"More the merrier," Liam assured her, but she waved him off. Sara poked him in the stomach on her way past.

"Cue up some Blasto, will you? It's better in the cargo hold than watching on my omnitool," she said. Then she wandered off, yawning.

"Sure you don't want to join?" Liam asked Cora. She quirked an eyebrow at him.

"Positive," she drawled, in that way she had, of making you feel like maybe she meant six different things at once. Liam shrugged, and turned back to the research module. Now he was having trouble focusing for a whole different reason.

What Blasto movie perfectly captured the moment?

After a few minutes, he gave up trying and went down to the lower levels. Had to grab a snack from the kitchen, for his friendly neighborhood biotic. Between Sara, Cora, and Peebee the rations tended to move quick. But they were worth it. Best he could do, snack wise, was canned salted potatoes. But heated up they tasted almost like baked potatoes, and if they were heated up and he squinted hard enough his brain crinkled they tasted a little bit like potato chips. That and the drinks- fresh homebrew from Kadara, picked up last time they docked – and he was all set.

After some consideration he decided on the first Blasto movie. A classic. It came out when he was just a kid, and he'd actually seen it in a theater. Maybe Sara had too. But she was sure to have seen it before which was just the speed she'd asked for.

And really, it was normal he'd feel competitive with Reyes, he told himself. Didn't even necessarily have anything to do with Sara. Reyes was just the kind of guy he used to watch out for when he was a cop, and that went double for crisis response. Working with him was never going to sit right.

And so what if he wanted to make sure Sara had a great "night off" with him? She was the Pathfinder. Part of his job as her team mate was making sure she was all right. Stress wasn't all right.

Jaal said _love_ but Liam hadn't. And yeah, he didn't want Sara dating Reyes. And no, his motives weren't purely altruistic. But if she decided she just wanted to be work colleagues who occasionally saw a movie together, that was just fine. _Really_ fine. Not passive-aggressively-wishing-it-were-dating fine.

Didn't mean he couldn't enjoy seeing the movie with her, did it?

She came down earlier than he would have imagined. Her sleeves were rolled up, the first button of her conservative ship knit undone, she looked more than ready to kick back. And she came alone.

Would have been fine if she brought other folks – more the merrier, he meant it—but he wasn't going to complain about alone.

"Did you actually read the expense reports?" he asked her. She narrowed her eyes and held out a hand, wordlessly. He put a beer in it.

"Sam checked the numbers before I sent them off. It's good."

"I detected two mathematical errors," Sam said. Ryder took a long swallow of her beer.

"Better than I would have done. My eyes about cross," she admitted. "Math's fine, but accounting? Yech."

"With you there." He grinned, and settled back on the couch. They hadn't watched a vid together since—well. Since right after that day on Aya. Felt like a long time ago. "Thousands of lines of addition? Kill me now."

"Boring," Ryder agreed. She sat down, bare feet tucked up under her. "Speaking of- what Blasto did you get cued up? Not 3rd Time Lucky, right? Because I'd rather be doing accounting."

"Come on. I'm not an idiot," Liam grinned. "Got the classic. The original. Blasto One."

"Holy crap, yeah." He hadn't seen her smile like that in weeks. "I haven't seen that since I was a kid."

It was like a little slice of home to watch the opening credits. They were halfway through the speakeasy scene, and their second drink, before either of them spoke again.

"I saw this in a theater, you know. With my mom," Sara half whispered. He turned, but she wasn't upset. Or she didn't look upset.

"Good memory or. . ."

"Good memory. Still hurts," she said. He paused, unsure, but- what the hell. Treat others as you want to be treated, right? He opened his arms, inviting her to lay her head against his chest if she wanted. Willing to look a bit silly if she declined. But she didn't. She folded up against his chest. A solid warm weight. He curled his arm around her, firmly tucking his hand against her side.

"We can turn it off—"

"No. Keep it on." She kept drinking, tilting her head back into his ribs every few minutes. He found he didn't so much mind. "We saw it on the Citadel. Huge, beautiful theater in Tralet Ward."

"I saw it on the Citadel too," he said. "Not in Tralet Ward, though."

"Do you ever wonder. . ." She paused, and he held his breath, not wanting to miss what she said next. "What if we'd met? We could almost have grown up together. Similar ages, and both on the Citadel. Same kinds of interests."

"Citadel's a big place," he smiled. Her hair, just under his chin, smelled faintly like cinnamon. Like home at Christmas time. "But it could have happened. Better than that, though, is knowing you now."

Aw, shit, now he'd done it. He promised he wouldn't get clingy. But here he was, starting in on cutesy shit. But she didn't seem to mind. She just snuggled in to him, and turned her attention to the movie.

By the time Blasto was facing off with the corrupt mayor, she was asleep against his chest.

He didn't move her. He settled in, slowly, inching down to a comfortable position for him to sleep, too. And he put another vid on.

He hadn't felt this at-home in more than six hundred years.


	6. Chapter 6

"You seem restless, Sara," SAM said. Its voice peeled out from its little speaker on her desk, an external version of the tiny voice she always carried with her. She paused in her swaying. She'd stood at her desk reading messages, and ended up sidestepping and swaying and almost dancing. Fidgeting.

"I'm good. Tired, honestly." After a fourteen hour day running and jumping every bit of her hurt, and the fidgeting was more like little frustrated twitches. No matter how tired she was, bone-deep dissatisfaction kept her moving. And she had a good idea why, but she wasn't about to discuss it with SAM.

"I know. If I may broach a topic we do not often discuss, Pathfinder?" SAM said, diffidently. Its change in tone surprised her into grinning, turning to look at the speaker as if that was really where SAM sat.

"Go for it? Why so formal, SAM?" she asked.

"Because I have been informed that humans are very secretive about their sexual desires, and I do not wish to cause discomfort," SAM said.

Sara groaned, rubbing her face with both hands. She slumped down into her chair. "I take it back, SAM. Don't go for it."

"As you wish. I was going to offer insight, not ask questions," SAM clarified. Somehow that didn't make her feel better.

"Still. Come on. My parents made you. You're like. . . like a little sibling. Kind of. I don't want to talk about that with you. If we could just pretend you never saw. . ." That night, with Liam. It all happened so fast, and it was all so unexpected. She'd been halfway, ah, through the experience before she remembered about SAM. And nothing short of live fire would have stopped her then. It was only afterwards, listening to the resounding silence in her head, that she gave any thought to the AI.

"It is my understanding that most humans seek sexual release alone, in order to address chemical imbalances," SAM said. Sara groaned again.

"Most humans don't have a built in voyeur. That used to live in their dad." She kicked her feet up against the edge of the desk, curling into a ball against the back of her chair. "Seriously, SAM. I know we're going to have to address this eventually. I'm only human. I won't be able to just power through forever. But I'm not ready to have this conversation."

"All right." SAM paused. "If you would be more comfortable addressing your chemical imbalances with Kosta than alone, I could endeavor to remain silent when you are conversing, so that you feel more private."

"That really, really doesn't help, SAM. It's just the illusion of privacy. And. . . Liam would have to be interested in that too, and I think that was more a one time thing. A near miss." She scowled, scuffing the bottom of her shoe against the desk's edge. Right after that night together it really looked like something was going to happen. But then she'd gotten all wrapped up in the many messes of Kadara Port, and things slowly returned to normal between them. No more flirting. No more big soft eyes while he told her how amazing he thought she was. Just business. And the occasional almost-jealous outburst over Reyes, but that hardly counted.

Well, and that night they ended up cuddling on the cargo bay couch. But if he wanted more, wouldn't he have taken the chance then? It was time to face it- they might well have gotten as close as they were going to get. What was it he'd said about it? One night is one night?

"That does not seem right to me- I believe it is your time that is missing, not his interest," SAM said. She opened her mouth to snap at it to just drop this but it continued, "When you are speaking his pupils dilate significantly, a classic sign of interest."

"SAM. . ." Prudence warred with curiosity. "When did that start?"

"It has been going on as long as you have been Pathfinder. I was not connected to you on Habitat 7, so I cannot speak to what occurred before," SAM said. She deflated, slumping down even further.

"That probably doesn't mean anything then," she said. "I don't know how I feel about you collecting biodata on the people I talk to, SAM."

"I do not have to tell you what I learn. But I think it's an advantage that should not be ignored," SAM protested.

"Maybe in negotiations. Not to talk to our friends," she insisted. She realized, abruptly, that she was far too sleepy to properly explain this to SAM. "I'm going to get cleaned up for bed. It's late."

"Goodnight, Pathfinder," SAM said. It was probably just her imagination that the AI sounded resigned. And of course, saying goodnight was just a matter of politeness. SAM wasn't going anywhere.

"Goodnight, SAM."


	7. Chapter 7

Liam was absolutely determined to keep his mouth shut. After their last trip to Kadara when he had his little outburst, he was surprised in the best way that Ryder wanted him to come along. He wasn't going to make an ass out of himself again. This was a great opportunity to show he wasn't a clingy jerk.

He certainly didn't need a repeat of his last disastrous not-relationship. If he thought about it, he could still picture Dee's face, wincing, telling him that clingy wasn't his best look and honestly, if he'd just let things develop naturally they might have gone different. Sara wasn't much like Dee, or any of his past girlfriends or not-exactly-girlfriends. She wasn't much like anybody. He still couldn't quite figure out how somebody so damn sweet could get so much done- she went from holding Jaal while he cried to killing the Cardinal in cold blood in less than half an hour back at that kett base. It might not work out between them- but he'd be damned if it didn't work out just because he couldn't keep his foot out of his mouth.

So he endured Vetra's brusque inquiries about his kit with the best grace he could muster, and did his best to focus up when the Nomad slowed to a stop. A short hike up a hill to a natural cave, and they could stand right next to Sloane Kelley. He couldn't understand at all why Ryder wanted to help the woman, but he kept his mouth shut about that, too.

He followed Ryder into the cave- flanking her on her right, while Vetra took the left. Vetra might not ever like him, but they agreed on this without having to say a word. Ryder's safety had to come first.

Even if she was just walking into an obvious trap next to Slone Kelley.

"You look like you're waiting for someone," Reyes drawled, stepping out of the shadows. Liam almost cursed, his finger twitching on his gun, but he held it together.

Reyes. Freaking. Vidal. Of course it had to be him.

"I'm here to meet the Charlatan, not some third-rate smuggler," Sloane scoffed. Never thought he'd agree with that woman.

"They're one and the same," Sara said.

Okay, what?

Liam exchanged a look with Vetra. She didn't know what was going on, either. And how long had Sara known that? Was that . . . had Reyes told her? Did they. . .

With an immense effort of will, Liam forced himself to focus up. Every hair on the back of his neck was prickling. This had the air of a trap that was working perfectly- except it wasn't his trap, and he didn't trust the man in front of him to breathe right much less look out for their best interests.

"The Roekar spy. The murder investigation. All of it was to undermine Kelley's power," Sara said. And maybe it was just his hope, but it sounded like she was just not putting it together herself.

"Death by a thousand cuts," Reyes said.

"You said you wanted to settle things. How?"

"A duel. You and me. Right now. Winner takes Kadara Port." Reyes jumped down from his high rock, meeting them on their level.

"You want to stop a war by shooting each other?" Ryder asked.

"Two people shooting each other is better than a lot of people shooting each other," Reyes said. And goddamnit, he actually agreed. If this was for real it was cool as hell. And brave.

"I'll take those terms," Sloane said. They began circling each other.

And then, the shot.

Kelley fell- and Liam's gun rose just like Vetra's, trained on the people pouring out of the shadows. But no one seemed to care about them, or Ryder, at all.

And she set off talking with Reyes like she didn't think there was anything dangerous about the man at all.

He caught just the first words- Ryder saying she guessed Reyes got what he wanted- and then they were off by themselves, speaking too low to hear.

None of his business anyway. He needed to be watching the rest of the Charlatan's crew. They picked up Sloane's body with practiced efficiency. He didn't even want to know what they had planned for it.

Ryder came back alone, and quickly. She stalked out of the shadows and past them, out of the cave, with a deep frown on her face. Another glance at Vetra, and both of them followed.

And slowed, almost in step, when they saw Sara standing by the Nomad. She looked. . . pissed. And she wasn't moving. Just standing there, hands balled at her sides, staring off into the distance.

Vetra stepped forward first.

"So that was a surprise," the turian said. Sara actually turned around, her expression clouded. "Did you know about that?"

"No, and I should have. I feel . . . real stupid, right about now," Sara admitted. That tugged at his heartstrings and no mistake. He holstered his weapon, and sidled up next to her.

"Lies say more about the liar than the audience," he said. And he wasn't even sure he was making sense, but he wanted to say something that would help. "You're brilliant. Good at lots of things. This is on him."

"Right," Vetra said, shooting him a look over Ryder's head and yes, he knew his mouth was an idiot, no one knew more than him. "Like you said before. Who has time?"

Before? Oh. Right. He was actually there for that conversation. Who has time for a relationship?

Did that mean she was in a relationship with Reyes?

He could feel his blood pressure spiking. He forced himself to take a deep breath, in, then out. And again. There was no room here for his ego. He'd told her, hadn't he, that he was a big boy-wouldn't get clingy. He'd weathered one-sided feelings before.

This just felt. . . worse. Like his lungs were sinking down into his guts and his guts were crawling up his throat.

He took another deep breath.

"Yeah, well. . ."Ryder sighed, and for some reason she was looking at. . . him. Why? What did that mean?

Probably nothing. Right? He was just losing his mind.

"Look," he said, clearing his throat, "Call's made. The Charlatan runs Kadara port, and he'll be a lot friendlier than Sloane. Today's a win for the Initiative, Pathfinder."

"Yeah." Ryder straightened at that, and smiled her little half smile that made him feel fizzy in all the best ways. "Gotta remember the wins."


	8. Chapter 8

It wasn't always fun.

Back in the beginning, when Dad first died and everybody seemed so sure she was going to mess up as Pathfinder, nothing was really fun about this job. She couldn't stand to hear her own words from back then over the speakers, clipped into newscasts- st the time she felt like she was keeping her upper lip stiff enough to please any soldier. But hearing it now? She just sounded scared.

And who wouldn't be? Especially after Addison laid into her, furious that a rank beginner was somehow in charge of doing the impossible, for life or death stakes- it was so hard to believe that she could actually save anybody.

It was on their faces, the people sitting in med bay like Scott, watching her walk past- they heard her voice dozens of times a day sprinkled in with reports and other official statements. They looked up to her. Everywhere she went, people looked at her like she carried the weight of the world.

Everybody but Scott. And her crew. But today, right now, it was all about Scott.

She hugged her twin, happy to feel the strength that was returning to his arms. He looked better. Less pale- even though he was still spacer-pale, of course- and less gaunt. He looked better every time she came to visit.

They talked about him first, like always. His treatment and his progress and his frustrations, because it was easiest to start there. Harder to summarize the things she'd done since the last time they talked. But this time, he didn't wait for her to drift into telling him about Pathfinder business.

"Cora came by. She says you and Liam Kosta are. . . how did she put it? Cozy?" Scott's smile was sly. She punched his shoulder, gentle as if he were a little kid, and smiled back.

"I didn't realize Cora was visiting you. Weren't you scared Dad was trying to set you two up?"

"She's a sweetheart. A good friend to have," Scott said, without a trace of self-consciousness. "I'm not worried about Dad's designs because, well. You know. But don't dodge the question. You know I called you two six hundred years ago. Tell me the news."

"It's not. . ." She stopped, chewing on her bottom lip. How could she explain something she hadn't really figured out? That she didn't even have time to figure out? "We're not a thing, not really. Kind of flirted with the concept but then stuff just sort of happened. Pathfinder business sort of got too busy. We hit Kadara, and then the Archon's ship, and it's just been. . . it's just been a hell of a ride, you know? He tries to make sure I'm okay in our downtime, she might be noticing that. But he does that for everybody. He's a caring guy. Heart as big as the moon. It's not about me, per se. I don't think."

"Sounds like he's a real sweetheart too. A good friend to have, if nothing else," Scott said. He lay back, relaxing, and seeming to almost deflate with a sigh. "I'm not lifting my bet, though. I still think you two dorks go together."

"Ha." She snorted, eyes falling on her hands, twisting in her lap. With effort, she relaxed her tightening shoulders.

"Uh-oh." Scott curled back up, rising onto one elbow. "What? Spill."

"I'm not too busy. Not really. Not for somebody who's already on my ship, on my crew. We're always together already." She took a deep breath, and continued in a very small, quiet voice. "It's more that I don't think he's that interested. And, I'm the Pathfinder. I'm the boss. I can't ask. Or push. Or. . . you did win the bet. Technically."

"I. . . did?" Scott lay back down, pulling up his omnitool. He must have been pulling up his bank records, because he muttered, "Yeah, okay, right about. . . that was weeks ago! And you're just mentioning it now?"

"I was waiting for you to notice," she said, a smile flitting across her face. "He said, you know, he didn't want to get clingy but maybe we could see how it went and then. . . we hung out a few times after that, and it all just kind of. . . I don't know. It's like we're friends. We just flirt sometimes."

"Sara." Scott covered his face with his hands, rubbing his eyes hard. Through his fingers he said, "You never think ANYONE is interested. You're not good at this. You know that."

"Damn right I do." She sighed. "I know I have to say things bluntly, that I'm no good at picking up signals. I know. So I told him straight out that I was interested."

"And?"

"And he said, yeah, him too, but let's bank that for another day."

"Ugh. Sara, did it ever occur to you that maybe you're already dating and you just don't realize it?" Scott said, the words muffled by his hands. She rolled her eyes.

"I'm not doing that again. No. I'm pretty sure this is just. . . one of those things. Bad timing. Or whatever. And that's fine. You know why? Because there's a million other more important things to worry about here! This is just. . . down-time stuff."

"It's a personnel problem is what it is. This right here is why the Alliance didn't allow fraternization. All this uncertainty is worse for your team than just straight up dating." Scott lowered his hands and looked at her in a very familiar kind of fond exasperation. "It's too bad I can't come with you. I'm good at sorting out personnel stuff. All my C.O.'s said so."

"Yeah, yeah, nice try. You're stuck here in medical until you're cleared," she said. But then she relented enough to add, "But I will want you to come with me when you are. Even if it's just temporary, before you find your own niche. We've got a whole bunch of competing personalities on my ship. Sometimes I think I piss them off more than I help."

"It's working. Everybody says so. You're doing fine." He reached up and squeezed her arm, in reassurance.

"Even though somebody off ship can spot a personnel problem?" she asked, dryly. He chuckled.

"How about you try just like, asking him? Or even just giving the guy a hug and seeing how that goes. Or, you know. If I'm reading it wrong and you're not that interested, tell him so. Blunt, clean break."

"Maybe." She closed her eyes, and took a deep breath, then let it out on a sigh. "You know I'm going to pester the shit out of you when you're out of medical. Every date you go on. Just blah-blah all the time. In payback."

"You can certainly try."


	9. Chapter 9

Almost all the arrangements were made to have a soccer game down at Prodromos. Something simple. Or it should be. All Liam needed was a confirmation from Bradley that enough folks could be let off duty to play. It was hard to nail down exactly when they'd arrive, so it wasn't a small ask.

Soon as he heard back from Bradley, he could sleep. Felt like it'd been days since he properly slept. It wasn't, though- just a bare, easy twenty hours, with only a few firefights in between. He must be losing some of his edge.

While he waited, he sat down on the couch in the cargo bay, a vid playing on the screen, and just leaned back. If he didn't close his eyes, he wouldn't fall asleep, or miss Bradley's call. All he had to do was keep 'em open.

No easy task.

He was in the middle of fiddling with security measures on his omnitool, to stay awake, when Sara came in. He smiled sleepily in greeting.

"Hey!" She came and sat down on the couch, across from him. It took a moment to register, but she seemed tense. He dug deep for the last few shreds of alertness and turned his attention to her.

"What's up?" A nice, neutral beginning. With luck nothing too big would be wrong.

"I, um. Well, I talked to Scott," she said, and stalled. He waited as patiently as he could for her to continue. Of course she talked to Scott, she did so every time they visited the Nexus. Also known as the only place he went today where people didn't shoot at him.

"He reminded me I sometimes don't communicate what I'm thinking very well. I can be a little oblivious." She wasn't looking at him. The whole conversation gave him an uneasy vibe. He sat up straighter. Something was definitely up, and he really wished he could put a pause on this conversation until he'd had some sleep.

"What's wrong?" he asked, because she wasn't really saying. For a moment, she looked at him, right in the eyes- and that had the usual effect on his insides, but it didn't help him figure out what was going on. He had to fight rising frustration- that wouldn't help anything.

"I never asked you if you wanted to date like, seriously," she said, at last, and wow that really wasn't what he expected when she came in.

He stared at her for a long moment, unsure what to say or do. Because she hadn't, exactly, asked him a question. And she hadn't said what it was she wanted. And he really, really didn't know what to say. Except, what came out of his mouth was, "I thought you had a thing for Reyes?"

Because his mouth was an idiot.

Her eyes widened, eyebrows climbing. "No? Other way around, if anything. Not that I don't admire what he's done with Kadara port, because I really do. But that doesn't have anything to do with. . ."

"Doesn't it?" Because if she had a thing for someone else, that was just it for them. Romantically. No hard feelings, but that was one area of life where he just didn't want to compete with anyone else.

"No." Her brows drew down, confused, frowning. "No, I don't. . . I am not . . . I wouldn't be asking you about this if what I wanted was someone else. I'd just tell you that. Clean break."

Wait, so she wasn't just telling him that, and did that mean that what she wanted was him? Was that what was happening? His heartbeat picked up.

"So what are you telling me?" And damnit, but that was the wrong question too. His hands balled into fists, shoulders tight as a bowstring, because there was something important hanging just out of reach of his exhausted mind. Of all the times he really wanted to be smart, and here he was, being dumb as a box of bricks. But the words were out there, non-committal and not what he wanted to say, floating to her ears already.

Her frown deepened.

"I . . . wanted to say we should figure this out. Certainty is better than uncertainty. Scott called it a personnel problem," she said. And God, she was telling Scott about him? What was she saying? "This is all just a lot of pressure neither of us need. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said anything. Not yet. We're nowhere near done."

"We'll never be done," he assured her, but it didn't seem to come across as reassurance. Her frown didn't fade at all. "I don't mind taking just the time we have, for now, it's not about-"

His communicator sounded off. Bradley. Bradley and his damn timing.

They stared at each other a moment.

"I have to get that," he said, lamely. She nodded, her frown softening to a rueful smile. Which was not, damnit, what he wanted. That smile still meant unhappiness.

"Go ahead. We're fine. I'm sorry for bringing it up," she said, but no, that wasn't what he meant, and she was already standing up and leaving. "You're really important to me. To this team. I hope. . . I hope I'm not messing that up. Let me know if you want to talk more later."

And then she was gone. Gone before he figured out what to say.

Cursing under his breath, he answered the comm and endured Bradley's good-natured ribbing about how long it took him to answer. They made a plan for the game, and signed off.

Except now he didn't want to sleep. He was still as tired, just, not nearly as peaceful.

Pressure, she said.

He returned to the couch and laid down, eyes closed, mind racing. She said all of this was pressure neither of them needed. Did that mean she did want to be serious with him, or that she didn't?

Maybe he could do something. A grand gesture, to get the conversation moving. Like when he traded that armor to Jaal. Maybe he could get some of that fruit from Aya? No, terrible idea. Or, maybe he could set up a vid night for the two of them . . . except they'd done that, that wasn't exactly a grand gesture. He could engineer something fun. A little bot that said nothing but encouraging things. A jump-jet mod that made her vaportrail a bunch of little hearts. A bouquet of heleus-flowers.

No. None of that would help. That wasn't what she wanted, or needed- she'd said there was too much pressure. Already. What they needed was just to talk.

And, it sounded like she needed to know where he stood. Which seemed crazy to him. How could she not know? Didn't she realize how absolutely incredible she was? How anybody would be dying to be closer to her?

Maybe he was trying too hard. Like with the angara. Maybe he needed to just get back to basics. Talk to her. Gently. Without pressure.

Maybe at the game.


	10. Chapter 10

Serious. He wanted to get serious.

Sara's heart had leapt to her throat as soon as he said it, a million reasons why it was a bad idea to get involved and really, it didn't seem possible that he cared that much about her- not when everybody in Heleus wanted a piece of the Pathfinder. But he said it. That he wanted to be with her, just as herself- it seemed almost too good to be true.

She'd done her best with the soccer match, but she'd never really played before. Liam said he was rubbish, but it turned out his definition of rubbish was much different than hers. It did a lot for morale, though, it was obvious- every time she fell or whiffed at the ball and was still grinning made everybody else grin, too.

She switched out pretty early, though. Cora came with her, ruffling her short blonde hair. Even Cora seemed more relaxed.

"Exercise through a game. Feels like being a kid again," Cora said. She had to laugh at that.

"You're so hard core."

"Well, that's what serving with asari huntresses does to you," Cora shrugged. "You want to see something really hardcore, I hear Bradley is gathering up a bunch of local homebrew. Are you going to come drink with the troops? And, ah, the civilians?"

Twenty feet away, one of the angara said something to Liam and he laughed, white teeth flashing in the sunshine. Her heart seemed to be taking permanent residence in her throat.

"I . . . have a lot of stuff to catch up on. E-mails. You know how it is. Maybe later." She swallowed, hard, but it didn't help. "Actually. . . . this seems like a good time to slip away. I'll try to make an appearance later."

She hoped that made sense. That she sounded professional and on top of everything. She gave Cora a little wave, and a smile, and started backing up, walking toward the Tempest.

Cora just nodded back. No one else seemed to care. She jogged up the gangplank, feeling a little like a kid playing hookey and a little like she had a fever that bubbled up out of her belly. The ship was empty, and it was the work of just a moment to skitter down the stairs and into her room.

She had to lean against the door for a moment.

"Are you all right, Pathfinder?" Sam asked, out loud for once. No reason to use their private channel here in her room. She took a deep breath and let it out slow.

"I'm fine, Sam. Just. . . nervous. I'm not sure that this is a good idea." Of course, she'd already said it. That she wanted to get serious. Whatever that meant.

"I understand. I believe that in most romantic relationships, it is normal to have questions about the parameters and rules that guide your experience. If you would like, I can quanitfy-"

"Sam," she interrupted, "please. . . don't quantify anything. This isn't that kind of athing. It's actually. . . remember that privacy mode we talked about?"

"I do, Pathfinder." Great. Sam didn't call her Pathfinder when it was happy.

"It's nothing personal, Sam. I know you're still listening in, I just. . . I need to . . ."

"I understand, Sara." Was Sam trying to . . . reassure her? That was something to think about later.

She took another deep breath. And pulled up her omni tool.

**Liam, could you come to my quarters to help me**

"What do I say?" she mused, hitting her head gently on the door behind her.

**Liam, could you come to my quarters real quick?**

Message sent.

Now what?

She didn't have time for a shower. Should she have showered then told him to come up? But then she'd have wet hair and- he'd be all sweaty from the game too, maybe it didn't matter it was just that back home she'd have showered before a date but maybe they were just going to talk and maybe it wasn't a date at all and she was definitely overthinking this.

She skinned out of her armor, at least, but didn't have time for anything else before there was a knock at her door. She opened it with her omnitool from halfway across the room.

"Very smooth," Liam congratulated her. He seemed relaxed, too. Why was everybody relaxed but her? "If you wanted to keep all that under wraps, I'd say that worked."

"Thanks." She wasn't sure that was the right response- but it was hard to find the right words. Liam's smile was turning quizzical. Oh, right, she called him here. "Um. Hi."

"Sara are you. . . nervous?" Something sparked in his eyes, and his grin spread wider.

"Yeah?"

"Sara Ryder, nervous over me. That's one that might go to my head." He took a step toward her, but stopped. "Question is, are you nervous I won't kiss you or nervous I will?"

"I. . ." She shrugged, her palms turned out toward him, open and uncertain. "I don't know what being serious means."

"Well, what do you want it to mean?" He was still smiling. Big brown eyes watching her, like there wasn't any kind of wrong answer. Like everything would be okay no matter what.

"I want to wake up with you," she blurted out. His eyebrows climbed, his smile reappearing wide and happy. "And spend more time together. And I want you to tell me when you're planning something risky, even if you think it's not Pathfinder stuff. And I want you to tell me what it is you think it means, because I'm not very good at guessing."

"All of that sounds good to me." He started walking toward her again. Three steps. His gaze fell from her eyes to her lips. "I can't stop thinking about that night. About you. But it's not just fun if we keep going, sleep together more, you know? Can't be."

"Why not?" She took a step, too. Close enough she had to tilt her head back to look at him. Close enough to kiss. He grabbed her hand, lacing his fingers through hers. His other hand curled near her face, fingertips just brushing her cheek.

"Doesn't feel like just fun," he murmured. Her hand resting on his chest, she could feel his heart beating as fast as hers.

Just a breath, a little movement, to go up on her tiptoes and kiss him. The hand that was near her cheek slid into her hair, and he kissed her back, pulling her into him. For just a moment, it seemed like he was the only solid thing in the world.


End file.
